


once there were oceans violent inside us

by steelplatedhearts



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-19
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-25 11:28:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9818345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/steelplatedhearts/pseuds/steelplatedhearts
Summary: same story, different versions--all have merit, but the truth lies somewhere in the middle, in the dark damp places nobody dares to look.





	

There is a man, and a woman.

The details change over the centuries—the man becomes a sailor becomes a pirate becomes a monster; the woman becomes a mermaid becomes a goddess becomes the sea—but at its heart, the story stays the same.

There is a man and a woman, and there is heartbreak, and that is a story the world is intimately familiar with.

*   *   *   *   *  

When Zela Moneaux tells her son the story, it goes like this:

She claws her way out of slavery, takes advantage of a pirate attack on the town, and runs with her mother and sister. Amid the chaos of the battle, nobody notices when the three of them slip aboard the pirate’s ship and hide down below. As they settle in, her mother whispers a prayer that the captain will not return them to the town when they are discovered.

Captain Teague does not return them to town, nor does he pitch them overboard or abandon them on a deserted island, as her sister had started to nervously speculate. Instead, he offers to take them wherever they care to go, and to sleep somewhere more comfortable besides on a bed of rope in the hold.

The captain is a kind man, and she likes him well enough. She doesn’t love him, nor he her, but the voyage back to the bayou of home is long, and she knows enough of this world to take comfort where she can, whenever she can. He puts them ashore where they came from, and that would have been the end of that, had it not been for Jack.

She loves her son more than anything in the world, but as it turns out, he is not hers alone. Teague has a bloodline, an important one, and he will not let his son live out his life in a swamp. He’s not the most _involved_ father in the world, and when Jack is small, his contribution mostly involves showing up every few months with presents and wild stories. The affection he and Zela had for each other once wears thin, until they’re mostly keeping a civil presence for the sake of their son.

Zela doesn’t need Teague to tell her Jack will grow up to be a pirate. She’s been able to read it in his face since he was a child, seen the brilliant smiles when he spots sails on the horizon, and seen his longing for something greater. He sits at her side, listening to her explain how her magic works, but his mind is always elsewhere. He has never been a patient child, has no interest in sitting and learning her craft, but for now he belongs with her, and she does the best she can to keep him occupied.

When he’s six, he gets into the habit of climbing out the window when he’s supposed to be in bed and sailing off down the river, taking his little boat out to explore. Someone usually finds him and hauls him back home, as he hasn’t quite managed to learn how to be sneaky.

Tonight, her mother brings him back, holding him by his ear. “You ought to do something about him,” she says, grumbling. “He’s going to get into trouble.”

“Thank you, mama,” she says, gathering him in her arms and firmly shutting the door.

“Am I in trouble?” Jack mumbles into her shoulder. “I only wanted to watch the stars.”

“I know, my little sparrow,” she says, taking him back to bed. “But you can’t run off like that. Not yet.”

“But someday?” he asks, looking at her hopefully.

“Someday,” she agrees, lying down next to him. “For now, let me tell you a story.”

His eyes light up. “About Da?”

“No, this one is better,” she says. “This one is about the sea.”

That’s Jack’s favorite subject, so he quiets down and snuggles close.

“Once upon a time,” Zela starts, “the sea wanted to see all the world had to offer, so she took human form and traveled the land. She saw much that enchanted her, but none brought her as much delight as the sailors who roamed her waves.”  
“Like me,” Jack whispers.

“Much like you,” Zela says. “There was one sailor whom she loved above all else, and so she granted him her favor and gave him a job to do. He would spend ten years sailing from this world to the next, ferrying souls of those who died at sea, and only one day on land, to be with her in her human form. The sailor followed this duty faithfully, but when he returned home, she was nowhere to be found.”

Jack gasped, betrayal visible across his face. “That isn’t _fair_ ,” he said angrily, sitting up. “She promised! If she loved him so much, why didn’t she wait?”

“Because no man can tame the sea, darling,” she says. “And freedom is more important than any man, no matter how much you may love him.”

She watches Jack’s face shift, watches something in his heart click into place. “I understand,” he says slowly. “About wanting to be free.”

“I know you do,” Zela says, hugging him close. “Now, it’s time to go to sleep. If you want, tomorrow I’ll take you out on one of the fishing boats.”

“Thank you, mama,” he says, yawning. “Goodnight.”

He falls asleep quickly, and Zela kisses his forehead. “Good night, my little sparrow,” she murmurs. “Sweet dreams.”

*   *   *   *   *  

It is his voice that first draws her.

Back then she is not Tia Dalma, and only rarely Calypso—her name, to her daughters, is Thálassa, and it is with her daughters she spends all her time. They leap in the storms, dive to the deepest trenches, and she can sense everything on the waves and under them. What she senses, one sun-drenched day off the coast of what will someday be Scotland, is singing.

It is not particularly good singing, not the beautiful angelic voices of her daughters, but a rough, salt-soaked voice, singing some old lullaby that she can’t place. It draws her like a beacon, and she follows the call to the surface. When her head breaks above the water, the light is dazzling, sparkling off the surface, and she blinks rapidly, trying to adjust. Her vision clears, and nearby there’s a fisherman in a small boat, jaw dropped mid-song.

“Hello,” she says, hoisting herself up to lean on the rail. “I like your singing.”

The fisherman closes his mouth, then opens and closes it once more. “Thank you,” he says, finally. “My mother sang it to me, when I was small.”

“You have a way with songs,” she says. “Your voice—”

“It’s rough, I know,” he says, looking down and flushing.

“It’s distinct,” she says, leaning her head on her folded arms. “Like a strong tide.”

“Thank you, miss,” he says. “You’re too kind.”

“What is your name?” she asks. There is something striking in his face, lined and weathered, and his eyes are the color of her beloved waters.

“Davy Jones, miss,” he says. “And yours?”

“Men call me Calypso,” she says.

“But is that your name?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.

She laughs. “A smart question, Davy Jones.”

“And one which as of yet has no answer, may I point out,” he says.

“It is but one of my names,” she says. “One of many.”

“And a lovely one,” he says.

She beams. “Pretty words. What has the sea done to hear such sweet words and such a beautiful song?”

“The sea has provided, Calypso,” he says. “The catch today is small, but it will still make a fine meal.”

He motions over to the sad pile of fish at the other end of the boat. She knows fishermen need more than that to turn a profit, she hears their prayers for bountiful catches daily. She has heard nothing from Davy Jones.

“Don’t you want more?” she asks.

“I wouldn’t ask for that,” he says. “You can’t demand things from the sea.”

“No,” she says, pushing back from the rail. “But you can ask.”

He narrows his eyes. “What are you saying, miss?”

“ _Ask_ ,” she says, sinking lower. “And perhaps it shall be given to you.”

He’s quiet for a moment, brow furrowed. “I would like a larger catch, please. If it’s not too much trouble.”

“And you will have it,” she says, sinking beneath the water. The fish around her surge to the surface, leaping into the air, and Davy Jones’ delighted laugh pierces her heart like an arrow.

*   *   *   *   *  

When Lydia Swann tells her daughter the story, it goes like this:

They’re at the seaside for Elizabeth’s seventh birthday, as they were for her sixth birthday and her fifth. Lydia imagines that trips to the seaside will be Elizabeth’s birthday wish long into her adulthood, even if Lydia herself is not there to see it.

It took all her energy to make it this far out, and Weatherby is hovering around nervously like if he takes his eyes off her for a minute she’ll drop dead.

“Stop worrying,” she murmurs, taking advantage of Elizabeth hanging half out of the carriage to get a glimpse of the shore. “I’m not going to die today.”

Weatherby makes a small unhappy noise. “Lydia—”

“Let’s not do this today,” she says, cutting him off. “It’s Elizabeth’s birthday.”

He nods and sits back. “Elizabeth, do sit down. We’ll be there momentarily.”

The carriage barely slows before Elizabeth catapults herself out, skirts flying as she runs down the beach. Weatherby makes a slightly disgruntled noise as he helps Lydia out of the carriage.

“You’re not fooling anyone, you know,” she says. “You can grumble all you like, but it’s nice to see her so happy.”

A smile plays at the corner of his mouth. “I suppose I can’t deny that.”

“Take me to the water, love,” she says, leaning against him. “I want to put my feet in.”

He motions to the driver, who takes a small bench off the top of the carriage and sets it up a little ways in. She settles on it, removing her shoes.

“I’ll take those back to the carriage, get the picnic set up” Weatherby says, pressing a kiss to her temple. He straightens up and focuses on Elizabeth, splashing around waist deep in the water. “She’s going to catch her death.”

“Lizzie, my love,” Lydia calls out. “Come back in, your father’s worrying.”

Elizabeth runs back, flushed and happy. “I’m _fine_ , father,” she says, throwing herself on the bench. “The water is lovely!”

“I’m sure it is, darling,” he says. “But stay close to the shore while I get lunch ready.” Elizabeth makes a face, but stays firmly on the bench.

“Are you having a good birthday?” Lydia asks.

“Very,” Elizabeth says, not looking away from the sea. “I wish we could live here.”

She sounds uncharacteristically wistful, her small arms wrapped around herself.

“All right, Lizzie,” Lydia says, brushing a strand of hair off her face. “Why so unhappy?”  
“I’m not unhappy,” Elizabeth says. “I was just thinking about living here, and how that would mean I could walk on the beach every day, and maybe we could get a little boat—”

“That sounds lovely,” Lydia says gently when Elizabeth breaks off.

“But I can’t do any of that,” Elizabeth says. “People already think I’m odd.”

Lydia sighs, wrapping an arm around her daughter. “Let me tell you a story,” she says. “I think you’ll like this one.”

Elizabeth brightens. “Is it the new penny dreadfuls about Mistress Ching? Those are my favorite.”

“No, the latest one hasn’t come in yet,” Lydia says. “This one is an old story, one my mother told me when I was your age. Once upon a time, the sea left the water and came to shore as a beautiful woman. She danced, and she sang, and she laughed.”

Elizabeth smiles a little, leaning into her mother and looking back out towards the waves.

“She fell in love with a handsome sailor, and as a mark of honor, gave him the job of ferrying the souls of those who died at sea to heaven,” Lydia continues. “It was a full time job, so he could only come on land one day every ten years. Then, and only then, would he would get to see his love again. But ten years was a very long time, and the sea grew restrained and restless. She waited as long as she could, but eventually she could bear it no longer, and returned to the water. She never saw the sailor again.”

“If she loved him so much,” Elizabeth says suddenly, “then why didn’t she wait for him?”

Lydia follows her gaze to the horizon. “Look at the waves coming in,” she says. “At the foam on the crest. Does any of it follow the same pattern twice?”

“No,” Elizabeth says. “They’re all different.”

“Precisely,” Lydia says. “The sea is always changing, always moving. To ask it to stay in one place for ten years would be cruel.”

“I feel like that,” Elizabeth says abruptly. “I don’t want to stay in the same place.”

“I know,” Lydia says. “You want to go out there, don’t you?”

Elizabeth hesitates for a moment before nodding.  
“Your tide will come in, my darling,” Lydia says. “And when it does, all those people who call you odd or strange will be just a speck on the horizon before they disappear entirely.”

Elizabeth turns and throws her arms around Lydia, hugging as tight as her small frame will allow. “Thank you, mama,” she says, voice muffled against Lydia’s shoulder.

“Of course, darling,” Lydia says. “No matter where you go or what you do, never forget that I will always be proud of you.”

*   *   *   *   *  

It is a fine thing, to have the love of the sea.

He always sails on smooth waters with fair winds, soaring over the waves like a bird. He dips his net into the depths and comes out with more fish than he could ever have dreamed of. He is _prospering_ , enough to turn his shack on the beach into a proper house, one he could be proud of. Calypso leaves things sometimes, as decoration—shells, whalebones, pearls hanging from the rafters. She comes and goes, staying away for months at a time. He doesn’t hold her to a schedule—that seems cruel, and it’s not like he’s going anywhere. He stays on the beach, going out with the tides to fish and selling his catch at the market. It is a simple life, for the most part, and one he is more than content with.

He has not seen her for three months when the storm comes.

He’s out a little farther than normal, following a school larger than he can remember, when the sky turns grey in a heartbeat. The storm is upon him before he can turn for shore, tossing his little boat like dice. He can’t steer, can’t row against the waves, can’t do anything besides hang on.

When the clouds part, his boat is gone, splintered and sunk. He is left with nothing, washed up on the shore like so much detritus.

She could have stopped it, if she wanted to. The questions swirl about in his head like the long gone storm clouds: was she being cruel? Was she just not paying attention? Does she not love him any more? If she would only appear, set the record straight, he would not continue to suffer. As it is, she doesn’t darken his doorstep for another two months.

It’s a beautiful day when she arrives, breezing through the door with a song on her lips. “I have missed you, Davy Jones,” she calls out, throwing her arms around his neck. She kisses him, but when he doesn’t move, she steps back, tilting her head and studying his face.

“You’re angry with me,” she says, frowning. “Why?”

“You sent a storm,” he says. “I lost my boat, my livelihood. You couldn’t have sent it somewhere else?”

“There will always be storms, Davy Jones,” she says, pressing her lips together. “Sometimes they hit where you don’t want them to.”

“I nearly _drowned_ ,” he says, turning away.  
He feels her rest her hand between his shoulder blades. “There are some who would consider that an honor,” she says quietly.

“There is no honor in death,” he says.

She hums a little, wrapping her arms around him. “I am sorry,” she says.

“Sorry doesn’t fix my boat,” he says, a little harsher than he intended. She draws back and he sighs, shoulders slumping. “I didn’t mean that how it sounded.”

“I understand,” she murmurs. “Let me help.”

“Do you have a boat hidden somewhere?” he asks dryly, and she laughs.

“I can get one,” she says. “A ship with a purpose.”

He turns to face her, brow furrowed. “What purpose?”

“You would be a light in the darkness,” she says, taking his hand and tracing the lines on his palm. “Guiding those lost at sea to the other side. It would be an honorable thing.”

“Sounds dangerous,” he says, dropping his free hand to her waist.

“You would be protected,” she says. “As long as you do the job, you will live.”

“Sounds busy,” he says, closing his hand over hers and pulling her closer.

“It is,” she says. “You would only have a day on land, one day once every ten years. But that is a small price to pay for immortality.”

“And for your favor,” he says. “No more storms?”

“No more storms,” she says, a wicked glint in her eye, and he bends in, sealing their deal with a kiss.

*   *   *   *   *  

When Sarah Turner tells her son the story, it goes like this:

She has not seen her husband for seven years, going on eight. Will is a good lad, quiet and thoughtful and helpful, but he has a tendency to daydream, and invent wild stories to keep himself occupied. She doesn’t know where exactly he got the idea that his father was a merchant, but she doesn’t want to disappoint him, so she doesn’t tell him otherwise. It’s not lying, she reasons, not if she never explicitly agrees with him. She sticks to noncommittal noises, little _hmms_ and _ohs_ , trying to keep him happy. It works, as he never seems to suspect his father is anything but a good, honest man.

She doesn’t hate her husband. She doesn’t, she swears, even if he left her with a baby all on her own, and sympathetic looks from the neighbors that make her grind her teeth down. She doesn’t hate him, but she doesn’t think she loves him anymore either.

Will has no such doubts, and asks for stories about his father constantly. She doesn’t lie—she tries to stick to old stories, things Bill told her about himself when they were courting. There’s every possibility that those were lies, but as far as she knows, they’re the truth, so she repeats them without a qualm.

But stories from Bill’s glory days, when he was young and beautiful and brave, wear on her, because Bill is gone. She doesn’t expect him to ever come back. So when Will asks for the story of his father’s visit to Spain, for what feels like the millionth time that week while she’s up to her elbows in laundry, she loses her usual composure.

“Enough of this!” she snaps. “I don’t have time to entertain you, lad, now leave me be!”

She regrets it as soon as she says it, but the damage is done. Will has never been able to hide his emotions well, and hurt is written all over his face.  
“Sorry,” he mumbles, backing away. “I’ll—I’ll come back later.”

He turns and scampers away before Sarah can stop him. She sighs, bracing her arms against the washtub, rubbing her temples.

She has to finish the washing. It’s her biggest source of income, and she can’t put it off any longer. But while she works, she keeps seeing Will’s pained face flash in her mind.

He hasn’t come out once, not since he retreated, so when she gets the washing hung up to dry, she goes looking for him. He’s had the same hiding place since he was little, so it isn’t difficult. He’s curled up in the wardrobe, sniffling under a blanket.

“Soon, you won’t be able to fit in there,” she says, opening the door. She sits on her heels, pulling the blanket off until his head is exposed. He’s been crying, but makes a hasty attempt to wipe his eyes when he emerges into the light.

“Sorry,” he says.

Sarah sighs. “I didn’t mean to yell,” she says. “But I’ve told too many stories about your father, and it’s hard for me. I miss him.”

This is both a lie and not, but the intricacies of her feelings for Bill are too complicated to burden a child with.

“How about we make a deal?” she says instead, turning the subject. “We put stories about your father aside for now, but I can tell you stories about other things, stories that I heard from him.”

Will considers this, and nods after a while. “Can you tell me one now?”

“I have to make dinner,” Sarah says, getting to her feet. “But I can tell you a story while I cook.”

Will nods, wiping his nose. “Thank you, ma.”

He follows her to the stove, takes his place on a stool by the fire, and waits patiently until she starts talking.

“I might get some of the details wrong,” she says. “It was a long time ago when I heard this.”

“That’s okay,” Will says quietly. “I don’t mind.”

“Well then—once upon a time, there was a sailor who fell in love with a beautiful woman,” Sarah says, casting about in her memory for the minutiae. “She was—a witch, I think, some kind of enchantress or something. Anyway, the sailor loved her more than anything in the world, and she loved him in return.”

She sees the beginning of a smile on Will’s face. He’s always loved stories of romance more than ones of adventure.

“But the sailor was cursed,” she continues. “He could only spend one day on land for every ten years he was at sea. The enchantress promised she would wait for him, but the next time he came to port, she was long gone. The pain was too much for him to bear, so he carved out his heart, locked it in a box, and hid the box from the world.”

It is, perhaps, not the most cheerful story, so Sarah thinks back to when Bill told it to her. “Your father told me, once,” she says, “that the heart was still out there for the taking, and any man who found it and returned it to the enchantress would be rewarded with luck beyond his dreams.”

Will is quiet for a moment. “If she loved him so much,” he says, “then why didn’t she wait for him?”

“She had to look out for herself,” Sarah says. “Sometimes men leave, and they don’t come back. You can’t know for sure what kind of man you’re dealing with until it happens.”

Will thinks that over as she plates their meal, then stands and hugs her tight around the waist. “I love you, ma.”

“…You’re a good lad, Will,” Sarah says, kissing the top of his head. “Now come on, eat your dinner.”

*   *   *   *   *  

The brethren don’t need Calypso to be present to bind her, so when she is trapped, it comes without warning.

She is fathoms below the waves, in the depths of the ocean, swimming as a whale with her daughters, minding the reef. She is there to visit Gorgona, who only recently wound herself among the coral to become part of the reef and part of the dead. Delfini is already there, winding a string of pearls around the branch that had once been her sister’s neck. Calypso swims to her, brushing off the small ache in her chest—it is only the hint of a twinge, it must be nothing—

But suddenly, in the blink of an eye, she is a whale no longer, just a human woman—small and shrunken and terrified.

There are many things to worry about, in those first few immediate moments. She is drowning, has a mortal heart and fragile lungs, she is hundreds of miles beneath the surface, she hardly knows how to swim with legs—but only one thing really matters. Her consciousness has shrunken in on itself, like an anemone pulling in its tentacles. She was aware of the vast oceans, of everything in them and on them, but now what she can sense is confined only to her pathetically small and fragile human body. She opens her mouth to scream and water rushes into her lungs, and she chokes.

Stars burst behind her eyes as she thrashes, kicking with newly made legs in an attempt to propel herself to the surface. She cannot tell which way is up, can’t even see anything once she has to close her eyes against the sting of the salt water. A pair of strong arms close around her waist, and she is dragged away. Her head is spinning, water is in her lungs, and there is a roaring in her ears that does not quiet, not even when Delfini pulls her to the surface.

She crawls up to the beach and vomits, expelling the salt in her lungs. Her beloved ocean has turned against her, rejected her fully. Her skin is stretched too tight, constricting her, and she claws at it, hoping if she can rip it away she’ll expand again. She scratches herself bloody, and the only thing it accomplishes is leaving a trail on the sand.

“What has happened to me?” she gasps, throat sore and raw. Delfini looks horrified, shaking her head in confusion.  
“I’m sorry, Thálassa,” she says, reaching out. “I don’t know.”

She holds Calypso close while she weeps. “Help me,” Calypso whispers, voice cracking. “Help me.”

Delfini nods, laying her down in the sand. “I will find out what happened to you, mother,” she says, pushing herself back into the water. “I swear it.”

Calypso watches her swim off, too exhausted to move away from the rising tide. The water reaches her toes, her hips, her chest, and she thinks: _maybe this will kill me._

*   *   *   *   *  

The man tries not to think about his story, let alone tell it, but when he does, it goes like this:

After putting Jones’ heart in the bag, James doesn’t look at it again until Beckett orders the chest unlocked and brought onto the Dutchman. It is a monstrous thing to see, even more so than the actual monsters crewing the ship. After Governor Swann’s attempt at stabbing the heart, Lord Beckett orders that the chest be locked back up, which James is quietly grateful for. He prides himself on not being rattled by the supernatural things he’s seen, but the heart is unnatural to an uncomfortable degree.

Even with the lid closed, the heart’s pulse echoes through the ship. His men have started moving in time to the beat, even when they’re not on duty. James has developed a habit of running his fingers along the railing and feeling the heartbeat through his hands, unable to escape the haunting knowledge that the ship is a living thing.

The heart is viscerally uncomfortable to be around, but magnetic at the same time, and James takes more than his share of late night guard shifts. This isn’t what he expected being an admiral would be like, back when he was dreaming of it as a midshipman—but so little of the world since those days has been what he expected of it. The chest is kept in Jones’ cabin, which means he’s a constant companion on shifts, silent and quietly radiating annoyance. They don’t talk, don’t even acknowledge each other’s presence, until James can stand the silence no longer.

“So what was the intention here?” he asks, motioning towards the chest. “Seems a lot of trouble, and it only made you vulnerable.”

He expects Jones to snap at him, to puff up and attempt to intimidate him, but he just turns away, stands in front of the cabin window and looks out at the sea. “Have you ever been in love, Admiral?”

James thinks back to the deck of the Pearl, to watching Elizabeth smile as she stood at the railing. “Yes.”

“And how did it end?”

“That’s a more complicated question to answer,” James says.

Jones sneers at him. “Try me.”

“I don’t think it’s fully ended yet,” James says. “But when it does—I don’t think it will be in my favor.”

“Then you understand the pain,” Jones says. “The agony that comes from a traitorous heart.”

“So you removed it,” James says, realization dawning over him. “To take away the pain.”

“Aye,” Jones says. “Pity it couldn’t take away the memories.”

“And what were those?” James asks. Jones snarls, and for a moment, James thinks he’s gone too far—Jones has punished his crew harsher for less. But Jones’ eyes flicker from the chest to the cannons, and he visibly pulls himself back.

“How about a trade, Admiral?” he says. “A memory for a memory.”

“Deal,” James says quietly. “You first.”

Jones sighs. “She told fortunes. But she’d never tell me mine, because she said it was bad luck to tell fortunes for those you love.”

“She used to tease me, for being too stiff,” James says. “Her father made her stop because it was rude, and I never—I was too focused on propriety to tell him I didn’t mind.”

“She liked to hear me sing,” Jones says. “I wasn’t particularly good, but she liked singing.”

“She chose what was right over what was easy,” James says. “I admired her for it.”

“I betrayed her,” Jones says suddenly, voice dark. “Without a thought.”

James clenches his jaw, looking away. “So did I.”

Jones laughs, hollow. “I can’t say I ever thought I’d have something in common with you, Admiral.”

James carefully glances back to see his eyes shining, a tear threatening to escape. “This method,” he says, putting a hand on the chest. “Would you recommend it?”

Jones does not answer, and the silence stretches out long past the point where it’s uncomfortable. James turns to face him fully to see Jones looking at him, expression nearly unreadable. It could be scorn or sympathy, or something else entirely.

“If I did, would you do it?” he asks quietly, tilting his head. “Would you carve out your heart, expose your most vulnerable self to the world for a chance at avoiding the pain?”

James closes his eyes, feels the pulsing of the heart through the lid of the chest. “I would,” he says. “If it worked.”

He hears the thump of Jones’ peg leg coming closer, until he’s right at his side. “It doesn’t,” Jones whispers. “Not even a little.”

When James opens his eyes again, the cabin is empty.

*   *   *   *   *  

“If I were at full power,” Calypso says, voice shaking with rage, “I would strike you down where you stood.”

“And yet, you are _not_ at full power,” Akantha says, sounding bored. “Which is why we bound you.”

The brethren have no respect, and their king even less. She is a cocky, disdainful woman, which is something Calypso would admire under different circumstances.

“I will be free,” Calypso says, stepping closer. “And when I am, I will come for you first.”

“That’s not giving anyone much incentive to help you out, is it?” Akantha says, raising an eyebrow. “If it makes you feel better, it was nothing personal.”

“ _How_ ,” Calypso growls, “is that supposed to make me _feel better_?”

“Means there’s nothing you could’ve done,” Akantha says. “Some people find that comforting. If you’ll excuse me, I have other things to do today.”

She strides off, leaving Calypso alone on the docks.

“Thálassa,” Delfini says from the water, voice small. “Please, let’s just leave.”

Calypso sags, suddenly weary. “I’m coming, child.”

She missed the initial ten year meeting—there were other matters in the sea that drew her attention—but the next one will be along after a time, and she will wait until then. Jones’ house is just as she remembers it, clean and slightly bare. “Do you think he will come?” Delfini asks. “You missed the last meeting.”

“He will come,” Calypso says. “He knows me well enough to expect that I would miss meetings sometimes.”

Delfini looks unsure, but says nothing.

Weeks turn into months turn into years, moving forward at their own rate, no matter how much Calypso wills them to move faster. It is torture, waiting so long, and she is so consumed with the waiting that she nearly forgets that the deadline is coming until it’s upon her.

Jones does not come.

Three days after he misses their meeting, she sends Delfini out to search the sea, find out what has kept him. She is gone a week before she returns, with news of a traitorous heart carved out of his breast. She writes one final letter, scribbled in haste, and sends Delfini out once more. An additional week passes, and Delfini returns, empty handed.

“I delivered your letter,” she says. “He did not read it.”

“Then he is lost to me,” Calypso says. “Thank you, my daughter.”

She retreats inside the house and cries, cursing the salt in her tears.

*   *   *   *   *  

For a brief moment before everything goes sideways, the chest is not the most important thing in the box (and doesn’t _that_ sound like some old nursery rhyme, Elizabeth thinks— _there’s a heart in a chest in a box in a hole in an island in the middle of the sea)_. What immediately draws her eye is not the chest with the pulsing heartbeat, but the letters surrounding it. There are dozens of them, bound in twine and ribbon and lace, all yellowed with age, as well as a few strings of pearls and a shell, glittering in the sunlight. There is something _upsetting_ about leaving them there, condemning them to the elements until they quietly crumble and are scattered to the wind. So when they’re running back to the longboat, Jones’ crew on their heels, she makes a quick detour.

She fills her pockets first, until they’re about to burst. The rest she slides down the front of her vest, and the pearls go around her neck. The shell she tosses back into the sea where it belongs as she runs for the boat.

With the kraken attack, she has no time to pull any of the letters back out, and with Jack dying ( _murdered_ , a part of her whispers, _dying makes it sound like nobody’s fault_ ), she nearly forgets the letters are there at all. It isn’t until Tia Dalma lays a finger against the strand of pearls, a questioning look on her face, that Elizabeth remembers.

“It—I found it with the chest,” she murmurs, fishing the papers out. “I couldn’t bear to leave them behind.”

Tia Dalma’s face is unreadable. “Even though they were not yours to take?”

Something in her tone reminds Elizabeth unmistakably of her father when he would catch Elizabeth in a lie, and she flushes. “Their owner didn’t seem to want them,” she says defensively. “And besides—if they’d stayed in the box, by and by they would’ve been forgotten entirely. And that didn’t seem right.”

“What does it matter to you?” Tia Dalma says. “You don’t know them.”

“I suppose not,” Elizabeth says, running her fingers along a broken wax seal. “But they still existed. They shouldn’t disappear entirely.”

Tia Dalma smiles slightly, hand resting on the locket at her breast. “You know you have a responsibility to them now, girl. If you take the letters, you have a duty to keep them alive. Is that a responsibility you’re willing to bear?”

Elizabeth bites her lip, looking down at the sheaf in her hand. The paper is thick, and suddenly heavy in her hands. “It is,” she hears herself say, as if from very far away.

“Good,” Tia Dalma says. Her hand hovers over the papers for a moment, but she curls her hand into a fist and pulls it back.

She leaves, and Elizabeth carefully slides the twine off the letter in her hand and unrolls it. The paper is stiff with age, and blotched where it was once wet. The script is—sloppy, too large in some places and too small in others, trailing up and down and squished when the writer ran out of room.

_My love,_

_This will be my last letter._

_It has been—_

_I don’t know how long it has been since you were meant to be here. I don’t understand how time works in this world. It used to be I turned my head and a month would be gone in the blink of an eye, but now I sit on the beach for an eternity and it has only been a day. I understand now, how long ten years can be. That won’t ease your burden, I know, but I can at least grasp it._

_I sat out on the beach yesterday, from sunrise to sundown. I watched the sun arc across the sky, crawling through the clouds. Lifetimes passed in that day, until at last the sun sunk behind the horizon. The moon brought the tides, but no relief, no break from the agonizingly slow march of time._

_I would say I was sorry, but we both know that would be a lie. I feel bad, but not sorry. It’s my nature. I only wish I could still have your heart to hold._

_If things were different, I would tell you to come back to me. But you have no more love to give._

_I love you._

Elizabeth shoves the letter back in her vest, eyes stinging.

“Are you all right?” Will says from her shoulder, and she jumps.

“Fine,” she says, turning away. “I’m fine.”

She can tell he wants to say something, looking at her with those big brown eyes. But he doesn’t, just closes his mouth and turns away, disappointed.

The letter isn’t signed, but in that moment, Elizabeth feels closer to the writer than she can imagine. She is not sorry, for Jack. She feels bad, but she is not sorry.

*   *   *   *   *  

He has not had a heart for all of three days, and already he considers it a resounding success. Everything is slightly _muted_ , like he’s been dunked into the ocean and left there, the crashing waves roaring in his ears and deafening him to the world. He feels lighter, emptier, and thinks of _her_ far less. He is still bound to the Dutchman, which isn’t ideal, but—there are worse fates than immortality, than a life at sea, especially when there is nothing waiting for you on land.

But even he can’t deny, things are different on the ship. The air is thick and still, even when they’re sailing with a fair wind. The sailors are acting strange, muttering to themselves when there is nobody there to listen. The deck beneath his feet begins to rot, in appearance if not in structure.

It’s the damn heart, he’s sure of it. He locked it in a chest, but it’s still beating, still echoing throughout the ship. It can’t remain there any longer. So he commandeers an old trunk from a crewman and gets ready to bury it.

The chest goes in first, but it’s not the only unwelcome reminder of the past. There is a shell she’d given him to hang over the door of his house, pearls she’d left behind like dewdrops, and letters. It all goes in without a second glance.

The locket, however, stays. He cannot think of a good reason to keep it, but as he holds it over the trunk, something stays his hand.

Isla Cruces is a plagued island, a good place for a plagued heart. As they’re lowering the longboat to send a party ashore, a mermaid pops her head out of the water.

“From Thálassa,” she says, holding a bottle aloft. Inside, Jones can see a scroll, tied with twine.

“She still dares to send letters?” he snarls. “Even now?”

“Please,” she says, arm unwavering. “Take it.”

They pass it up the rope to Jones, who breaks the bottle against the railing and fishes the scroll out. It is on cruder paper than the others, is not tied with the silk ribbon she used to use. He can see her handwriting through the top layer, ink flowing thick and dark. He stares at it for a moment, and then shoves it in the nearest crewman’s hands.

“Put it in the box with the others,” he says. “And get it off my ship.”

When he discovers a small tentacle that night, growing at the tip of his beard, he’s too hollow to truly care.

*   *   *   *   *  

When her children tell her story, it goes like this:

Syrena brings Philip to a small island, heals him as best she can, and leaves him there.

Oh, she visits frequently, brings him food and company, but laughs whenever he asks to be taken to civilization. There is never any sail on the horizon, no ships in sight, and he has resigned himself to staying on the island permanently.

He sets up shelters near the various pools so that Syrena can visit, and he still has his bible, although not all of it is legible anymore. It was waterlogged for so long that all of Numbers and a good half of Deuteronomy have been washed away, black ink running right off the pages. He starts reading aloud to keep himself grounded—an anchor to reality, a reminder that he has not been wholly abandoned.

He’s reading through Revelations when Syrena rises out of the sea, bringing a beautiful iridescent shell with her.

“I found it for you,” she says, holding it out. “It makes things like home.”

“Thank you,” Philip says, running his fingers over the rough surface. “It’s lovely.”

He puts the bible down and goes to hang the shell over the makeshift tent, and when he returns Syrena is absentmindedly tracing the words on the bible’s cover with her finger.

“Syrena?”

“You read a lot,” she says, voice soft. “Why do you always stop reading when I come here?”

“I wouldn’t want to be rude,” he says.

She laughs. “ _Rude_. What a thing to worry about.” She pulls herself half out of the water to sit closer, lying out on the shore. “Read me something,” she declares.

“Very well,” he says. “We’ll start at the beginning.”

He’s not even halfway through Genesis 1 when he sees Syrena make a face out of the corner of his eye. He ignores her and keeps reading, until she starts to sigh, loudly and visibly.

He closes the bible, using a finger to keep the page, and looks over at her. “Is there something wrong?”

She wrinkles her nose. “This is not a very good story.”

“It’s not just a story, Syrena,” Philip says. “It’s the word of God.”

“Your god, maybe,” she says, stretching like a cat and curling up on the sand. “Not mine.”

“He _is_ your god, Syrena,” Philip says wearily. “Whether or not you believe. He created you.”

The scornful look she gives him would be enough to make him shrink back if he had any energy for it. “I know who created me,” she says, voice frosty. “And it was not your god.”

Philip sighs, tipping his head back against the tree. He had believed once that Syrena would be easily taught, as she was one of God’s own creations. But as time went on, he was starting to think otherwise—her morals seemed entirely alien to him, and she was stubborn and unyielding, either unable or unwilling to grasp even the simplest of parables. He had told her a story last week about the early Christians who were eaten by lions before they would recant their faith. After the ten minutes it took to explain to her precisely what a lion was, her only reaction had been a vague musing about how the early Christians might have tasted.

“Who exactly do you think created you, then?” he asks.

“ _Thálassa_ ,” Syrena says, and her voice is so reverent that he has to take notice.

“Who’s Thálassa?” he asks.

“Mother,” she says, a sweet smile on her face. “She was gone for so long. Taken from us.”

“Taken?”

“Let me tell _you_ a story,” she says, smirking. “And then we will see which is better.”

Philip considers telling her once more that it isn’t just about entertainment, but decides to let it go.

“Long ago, when the sea was new, our mother created us,” Syrena says. “The first was Gorgona, and the second was Delfini, and from there our ranks grew. Always, always, we swam with our mother, who loved us above all else. The men who walked on land were lovely, true, but they were not her real loves. One man, one sailor, she loved more than any man, and he was _Odigo Selini_ , guiding lost souls to rest.”

The foreign words fall smoothly from her lips, and Philip finds his heart steadying at the melody of her voice.

“But he forgot himself,” she said, face darkening. “He came back to land and found her gone, not waiting for him, and he did a cruel thing. He had her bound in human form, cut off from her children. He was cursed, _Selini Prodótis._ ” She spits on the sand, eyes blazing. “She was suffering for a very long time, until she was freed. She suffered, and now he is dead, and it’s only her kindness that put him in the reef.”

“The reef?” he asked.

“it is our birthplace,” she says. “We are born there, and we go there when we die to become part of the coral. If you love someone very much, they are granted a place. Thálassa took her love to the reef, even though he betrayed her.”

“Would you call that mercy?” he asks.

Something in her softens. “ …I don’t know,” she says. “I asked Palírroia, but she said I was too young to understand. She said love for humans is different and strange and I would understand in time, when I found one.” She stares out at the waves for a moment, lost in thought. “So!” she says, brightening. “What did you think of my story?”

“It’s quite lovely,” he says. “But if your Thálassa loved this sailor so much, why didn’t she wait for him?”

“Thálassa waits for no man,” Syrena says disdainfully.

“And what about you?” Philip asks. “Would you wait?”

“I don’t need to wait,” she says. “I have you right here.”

“You have a valid point,” he says after a moment, and she throws her head back and laughs, high and clear.

*   *   *   *   *  

When his heart is destroyed and he falls beneath the waves, she is waiting for him. She tilts her head, staring into his eyes, and reaches out to put her hand where his heart should be.

“All these years I thought you were getting rid of the pain of grief,” she says quietly. “But it was the pain of guilt.”

“You knew,” he says, voice hoarse. “You must have known.”

She shakes her head. “I loved you,” she says quietly. “I would not believe that of you. Even if _you_ believed it of me.”

He feels ashamed, and shrinks away as best he can, but as she starts to swim, she keeps him close. The salt water does not sting his eyes, but he closes them anyway, lets the water rush past him. He has made a living—if you can call it that—of avoiding death, and now his time is up. He thinks maybe he should feel fear, but he doesn’t. He is tired, bone-weary, and ready to rest—if he’s being honest, he’s been ready for a long time.

“Open your eyes,” she says softly. “I want you to see.”

He obeys, and some distance away in a trench is the kraken. It’s much smaller than it used to be, and its tentacles wave gently in the current as a school of mermaids attends to it. “You brought him back,” he says, choking up.

“I gave him life,” she says. “I can restore it.”

“Can we stop?” he asks. “I didn’t want to hurt him.”

“ _No_ ,” she says sharply. “He is still recovering. He needs to rest.”

“I didn’t have a choice,” he says.

“You chose,” she says, swimming on. “You must own that.”

He is quiet for a moment. “Will he be all right?”

“His sisters will look after him,” she says. She falls silent, and he thinks the matter is done, but her face softens. “I’ll tell him that you cared.”

She keeps swimming, onward into the blue. He’s lost all sense of direction, even of up and down. She could be traveling, she could be taking him straight down to the crushing depths. He can’t tell any more, can’t see anything besides the water surrounding him. Occasionally he gets glimpses of something else, flashes of color and movement, but they’re all gone as soon as he sees them.

“We’re here,” she says, coming to a stop after hours of silence. “The reef.”

It is a massive thing stretching out in either direction for miles, and the schools of mermaids swimming around it are dwarfed in comparison. The coral is sprawling and twisted, and he is unmistakably reminded of his ship—formed from the bones of those who came before. Mermaids dart to and fro, draping seaweed and pearls over the various figures: fallen friends, revered ancestors, and human loves.

“…Why am I here?” he asks.

“You are here because I love you,” she says.

“Even now?”

She swims closer to the mountain of coral. “Part of me will always. The sea contains multitudes.” She rests his body on the branches, and he can feel them winding around his legs, creeping over him. “It feels wrong for you to be anywhere else.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, suddenly desperate. “I’m so _sorry_.”

“You cannot change what was done,” she murmurs. “You are dead. No moving forward.”

There is a stiffness in his joints, an ache in his bones, and he thinks he couldn’t push away even if he wanted to. “ _Calypso_ ,” he breathes, reaching out. “I’m so tired, Calypso.”

His hand brushes her cheek and her eyes drift closed as she leans in. “Sleep well, Davy Jones,” she says. “Sleep well, and know there will always be a part of you in my heart.”

The ghost of her lips brush against his forehead. “I love you,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

“You are forgiven,” she whispers, and for one shining, impossible, moment, he swears he can feel his lost heart beating wildly in his hollow, empty chest.

*   *   *   *   *  

The woman herself doesn’t often have the opportunity to tell her story, but when she does, it goes like this:

There is a boy, named Thomas, and his ma’s been dead for three years now, and he’s not going to last much longer. He didn’t do anything wrong, really, he just made friends with the wrong people—at least, that’s what the Lieutenant told him when they locked him up. He’s _scared_ when they lead him up to the noose, even though he knows he shouldn’t be—he’s ten now, he’s grown, and too old to be afraid. But he’s afraid anyway, and he asks God for forgiveness for being afraid. He just wants to see his ma, to go wherever she went.

“Now, Tommy,” she’d told him once, when he was small. “Whenever we’re in trouble—real trouble, the kind that seems impossible to get out of—there’s a song we’re meant to sing. You learn it well, and when the time comes, you sing it loud, and you be brave.” He doesn’t feel brave, not right now, but he wants to make his ma proud.

So he sings.

He makes it through one line before he falters, voice cutting out in fear. As he falls silent, a man at the end of the line picks it up, anger coursing through his voice. Slowly, the others on the line join in as well, and soon, all the condemned are singing, voices raised in sorrow and pain and defiance. They clash their chains together, stomp to the rhythm, and their anger bolsters his courage. He clenches his fist around the coin his mother gave him, and sings the last of the song as loud as he can.

The executioner pulls the lever, and everything goes dark. He is in the darkness for what feels like forever, stretching on and on into eternity. When he opens his eyes again, he’s on a beach, with a small rowboat nearby. The gallows is gone, the soldiers are gone—he’s alone, sitting in the sand.

“Hello, child.”

He starts, jumping to his feet, looking around for the source of the voice. There is a woman sitting on a rock, a beautiful woman with dark brown skin and a tattered dress.

“Hello,” he says, bowing on some instinct he doesn’t fully understand.

“Do you know where you are?”

He looks around, picks up the oar in the rowboat. “…Fiddler’s Green,” he says slowly. “My ma told me—you’re supposed to put the oar over your shoulder, walk inland, and someone will ask what you’re carrying. Then you get to stay in a nice place forever, where there’s always ale and songs.”

“You’re a very smart boy,” the woman says, smiling gently at him. “I am going that direction. Would you like to walk with me?”

“Yes please,” he says quietly. “Thank you, miss.”

He balances the oar over his shoulder and takes the woman’s offered hand, sniffling a little as they start to walk.

“You were very brave, to sing that song,” the woman says, after a time.

“I didn’t feel brave,” he says. “I was afraid.”

“You can be both brave and afraid,” the woman says. “One does not cancel out the other.”

That doesn’t sound right to Thomas, but he knows better than to argue with strange women, especially strange women taking him to Fiddler’s Green.

“Do you know what the song means?” she asks.

“I know it’s sung when pirates are in trouble,” he says.

“I don’t mean why the song is sung,” she says. “I mean the words. Do you know what they mean?”

“No, miss,” he says, embarrassed.

“It’s a story,” she says. “A story of a man who fell in love with the sea. And he wanted to be with her always, but for what you want most, there is always a price to be paid.”

She falls silent, glancing over her shoulder at the waves behind them. Thomas is quiet, waiting for her to continue.

“The sea loved him too, and so she gave him a duty,” she says, after a moment. “Ferry souls from one world to the next. All those who died at sea needed help crossing to the other side, and the sea loved her sailors. It was a kindness, even if not all saw it that way. In return, the man could step on land once every ten years, and be with the sea in her human form.”

“The sea has a human form?” Thomas asks.

“Of course, child,” the woman says. “The sea is many things to many people.”

“So what happened?” Thomas asks.

The woman sighs. “Ten years came and went, and when the man stepped foot ashore, the sea was not there. He was angry, and betrayed, so he went to the pirate king and told them how to bind the sea in a single form.”

“…And bound her in her bones,” Thomas says, thinking back to the song. “The sea is the queen?”

“Very good,” she says.

“Did the sea ever get released?” he asks.

“Oh yes,” she says. “After many, many years. She is free again.”

“ _Good_ ,” Thomas says.

They walk in silence for a little while longer, until Thomas can barely see the shore behind him if he looks, when the woman abruptly stops walking. “This is as far as I can go, child,” she says, letting go of his hand. “If you keep going, you will get where you need to be.”

“Will my ma be there?” he asks.

She smiles, bends down and kisses his forehead. “Your ma is waiting, child,” she says. “That’s a promise.”

She straightens up and walks away, but Thomas doesn’t move. “Wait,” he calls out. “I have a question.”

She turns back to him, an eyebrow arched. “Ask.”

“If the sea loved the man so much,” Thomas asks, “then why wasn’t she waiting for him?”

The woman smiles, closes her eyes, and turns her face to the wind. “She didn’t need to wait, because they never parted,” she says. “She was the sea. If he wanted to see her, all he had to do was look over the ship’s railing.”

He thinks about that for a moment, and nods. “Thank you,” he says. “For walking with me.”

“Thank _you_ ,” she says. “For singing.”

*   *   *   *   *  

“What will you do?” Elizabeth asks her.

The newly crowned king is barefoot on the beach, clutching the chest in her lap. Calypso wants to laugh at the desperation in her grip, wants to tell her all the white-knuckled clutching in the world will not change destiny. If Jones had given her his heart to hold, it would not have averted his final fate, nor would she have wanted to try. But she looks at Elizabeth’s set jaw and stubborn eyes and thinks—there’s a woman who would happily punch Providence in the nose.

“What will _you_ do?” she says instead, dodging the question.

“Find a ship and a crew,” she says. “Carry on.”

“Carry on,” Calypso repeats. “I like that.”

“Sometimes it’s all you can do,” Elizabeth says, attempting a nonchalant shrug.

“Then that’s settled,” Calypso says, rising. “I will carry on. I will be free. Fair sailing, Captain Swann.” She turns away and dives into the water, changing shape to flow with the tides. She is large again, vast as the wind and waves, and her heart soars once more.

When she stops in port next, she thinks, she will sing.

**Author's Note:**

> It's been an incredibly long time since I've posted anything, I know. I'm doing my best to get back into the swing of it!
> 
> Moodboard for the fic is [here.](http://steelplatedhearts.tumblr.com/post/157418337002)


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